Overall impression: Reviews of Brookhaven Health Care Facility are strongly mixed, with a clear divide between reviewers who encountered caring, attentive staff and rehabilitation services, and those who experienced significant problems with cleanliness, maintenance, staffing, and medical safety. Positive reports describe compassionate nurses and support staff, helpful social work (specifically one staff member named Samantha), meaningful activities, and acceptable meals with dietary accommodations. Negative reports raise red flags about hygiene, environmental maintenance, infection control, and neglectful or unsafe clinical care.
Care quality and staffing: Many reviewers explicitly praised individual caregivers — nurses and aides described as pleasant, professional, and treating families like family. The facility appears to provide convalescent and rehabilitation services that worked well for some residents, and several families said staff helped arrange returns home. However, a substantial portion of reviews describe understaffing, too few aides, and staff incompetence or laziness. Specific serious concerns include patients being placed in wheelchairs and left unattended, unsafe handling resulting in skin tears or injuries, and reports that basic medical needs were not met. There are accounts of critical clinical failures (diagnostic errors, incorrect assessments) and at least one patient being sent back to hospital with life-threatening consequences. These contrasting accounts point to inconsistent care quality that depends heavily on which staff members are on duty.
Facilities, maintenance, and cleanliness: Repeated complaints about the physical environment form a major theme. Several reviewers reported mildew, ceiling leaks, peeling wallpaper, cold rooms, urine odors, and visible bugs—conditions that indicate lapses in housekeeping and maintenance. Others described rooms as small but well laid out; double-occupancy rooms and limited closet space were commonly mentioned. While some families found rooms accommodating and the building presentable with lots of visitors and a nice atmosphere, the number and severity of cleanliness and maintenance complaints (including infection-control concerns) are significant and recurring.
Infection control and medical safety: Multiple reviews raised infection-control issues, including a report of a superbug infection and frequent hospital transfers. These comments, along with reports of torn skin and unsafe handling, suggest both clinical and procedural vulnerabilities. One reviewer noted a state investigation, and several families reported that administration responses were generic and unhelpful. Reports of poor medical assessment and diagnostic errors further contribute to concerns about clinical oversight and patient safety.
Dining, activities, and community connections: On the positive side, reviewers commonly mentioned palatable meals and the facility's ability to make dietary accommodations. Activity programming also received praise — families noted lots of activities and holiday celebrations, and a church connection/visitation was a meaningful feature for some residents. These communal and quality-of-life elements appear to be consistent strengths for many residents.
Management, communication, and patterns: Reviewers describe mixed experiences with management and communication. Some staff, including a social worker named Samantha, received direct praise for helpfulness. Conversely, families recounted feeling afraid to speak up, receiving generic administrative responses, and sensing a profit-driven culture with underpaid staff. The overall pattern is inconsistency: the facility can provide good, compassionate care and a supportive atmosphere at times, but persistent reports of poor hygiene, maintenance failures, understaffing, unsafe handling, and medical mistakes create a significant risk profile for prospective residents.
Bottom line: The reviews present a facility with real strengths in staff who are caring and in programming (meals, activities, rehab), yet with serious and repeatedly reported weaknesses in environmental cleanliness, maintenance, staffing levels, infection control, and clinical reliability. Prospective residents and families should weigh these polarized experiences carefully, verify current staffing and infection-control practices, tour rooms to inspect cleanliness and maintenance, and ask for recent survey/state inspection results before making placement decisions.
